ROYAL PALM POSTS $16.9 MILLION LOSS

Royal Palm Savings in West Palm Beach reported on Friday that it lost $16.9 million in the latest quarter ended Dec. 31, bringing the thrift's losses to $40 million in the past 18 months.

In addition, Royal Palm has a negative net worth of $15.8 million, a figure that has grown by $3.4 million since the end of the year, according to state records. An institution has a negative net worth when its liabilities -- what it owes to depositors and lenders -- exceed its assets.

Royal Palm lost $6.8 million in the same quarter a year ago. In the first quarter of its current fiscal year, ended Sept. 30, the thrift lost $3.8 million.

The thrift's chief executive, Joseph Burgoon, blamed Royal Palm's previous management for the losses, which result largely from $118 million worth of non-performing loans.

Burgoon said he could not predict when the thrift would return to profitability.

"The answer to that is that it's really hard to say when we'll return to profitability, because the major factor determining that is when we cease to have a negative net worth," Burgoon said.

Burgoon and other officers at the thrift are involved in a court battle with the thrift's founder, Robert D. Rapaport, who resigned as Royal Palm's chairman in November 1987. Burgoon has been head of the thrift since April 1987.

Rapaport, a Palm Beach developer who founded Royal Palm in 1983, could not be reached for comment on Friday.

He filed a suit in November, alleging that Burgoon and two other thrift officials extorted money from Royal Palm to cover up their mismanagement of the thrift. Burgoon has denied the charges and filed countersuits against Rapaport and the thrift's auditors, Laventhol & Horwath.

Royal Palm's problem loans represent more than 20 percent of its assets, which total $561.8 million. The thrift's percentage of problem loans has remained virtually unchanged since October 1986, when the Federal Home Loan Bank Board restricted the thrift's lending activities.

"Our continuing losses are the direct result of the poor quality of commercial loans approved by the bank's former management," Burgoon said in a prepared statement released on Friday. "The deleterious effect of such poor quality commercial loans has pervaded all of the bank's operations and is the primary reason we are experiencing negative net worth."

Royal Palm has been seeking new capital since June last year. Burgoon said he is talking with potential investors, though he would not name them.